Finding a viable way to solve our sovereignty

By Yang Liu Hsiu-Hwa 楊劉秀華

On Feb. 18, the Reverend Andrew Chang and I visited former president Chen Shui-bian (A-bian, 陳水扁). During the visit, we prayed with Chen and advised him to put his faith in the one and only true God in the universe, who created heaven and earth. Only when he puts his trust in the Lord Jesus will he be released and find peace.

I was very touched by Chen’s prayer. I believe that God will hear our prayers and grant grace to Chen. Trusting in God and letting God do His work is the only way to salvation.

An article in the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) on Feb. 24 by Chang said that A-bian’s case is a “political case.”

Political cases can only be resolved by political means.

Talking about political means, are elections the only political means? How can you guarantee victory in every election?

Within the system of the Republic of China, the courts are controlled by the Chinese Nationalist Part (KMT). Guilty people are often acquitted, while innocent people are convicted.

Former Executive Yuan secretary-general Lin Yi-Shih (林益世) was allowed go home to celebrate the Lunar New Year holiday with his family, but Chen was not. The difference is too obvious.

Political issues can be resolved by revolution. A revolution is not necessarily violent, but Taiwanese are not yet capable of such a revolution. Therefore, finding recourse to international law is a feasible solution.

According to the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty, the sovereignty of Taiwan is still undetermined. Taiwanese should use international law to resolve the issue of the nation’s sovereignty.

Recently, I read former president Lee Teng-Hui’s (李登輝) book Faith and Philosophy. It mentions that then-International Court of Justice judge Shigeru Oda suggested that Lee file a complaint to the court regarding Chinese interference with Taiwan’s sovereignty when he visited the nation in 1995 and 1996. The outcome of such litigation should have been effective.

Oda was willing to help Lee if he filed such a complaint to the International Court of Justice at that time. However, instead of solving the issue of Taiwan’s sovereignty through international law, Lee proposed his “special state-to-state” model of relations between Taiwan and China.

After 18 years, the issue of Taiwan’s sovereignty is still unresolved. How pitiful.

Conscientious Taiwanese have lost confidence in elections. Finding recourse in international law to resolve the nation’s sovereignty issue is the only way. It is the only route that can rescue Taiwanese.

For the sake of Taiwan’s future, I think solving the sovereignty issue should be the nation’s primary goal.

Taiwanese want to have their nation recognized as an independent country around the world. We must not limit our political maneuvers to elections.

Every Taiwanese must seriously think about the direction of our future efforts: how to fight for Taiwan’s sovereignty and how to become our own masters in this nation called Taiwan.

Taiwan is facing the threat of Chinese annexation. We need to resist and fight to the end, and not to give up simply because it is difficult.

Yang Liu Hsiu-hwa is the chairman of the International Cultural Foundation.